Hand Wash Only
by Athena's Owl
Summary: Child-proof is a... selective word. A Tiny Tracy story.


A/N: Just to let you all know this is my first story in the Thunderbirds category. I wanted to play with the characters a bit before I really started to focus on my multi-chapter. I'd like to thank my Beta spinkle22. Your help was much appreciated! Any remaining errors are my own. To avoid confusion, the ages are thus: Scott-9, John-7, Virgil- 5, and Gordon-3. Alan has yet to be born.

Disclaimer: I shall now introduce you to my rather sarcastic personality. I own every single aspect of the Thunderbirds, and anything else by Gerry Anderson. I am also the owner of a multimillion dollar business, 50 cars, and a binturong I have named Beep the Meep. Sarcastic enough for you?

**Hand Wash Only**

"Scott honey? I'm going next door for 10 minutes. I need to cancel the dinner plans we had with the Grant's for Wednesday, I had to make an appointment for the same evening. Can you watch the boys while I'm out?"

"Yeah mom," a nine year old Scott agreed, not really having heard what his mother had actually said. Most likely he wouldn't have agreed otherwise.

"Thanks a bunch, sweetheart. John's reading in the living room, Virgil's got his paints out in his room, and Gordon is taking his nap; the gate is shut by the way. Love you." She kissed him on the head, and Scott gave a disgruntled, "Mom!" being much too old for that sort of thing. Lucy Tracy just smiled at her son and gave him a playful swat.

"Make sure nothing gets set on fire while I'm gone," she said, then strolled out of the kitchen, laughing as her eldest son called after her, "Come on! That was only once!"

Scott rolled his eyes as his mother just laughed. It really was only once. And it had been for a good cause. He had been trying to make cookies for mother's day, at his teacher's suggestion. Only he had set the oven to 'grill' instead of 'bake' and the heat had come from the top instead of the bottom, subsequently overheating the icing on top. Scott had been somewhat surprised to find his cookies flaming rather than nicely browning. He had also been banned from baking for the next few weeks. The ban was now lifted of course, but he had no desire what so ever to go near the oven again. Ever.

The door slammed down the hallway as his mother left the house. Scott turned back to the homework he had been doing at the kitchen table. His brothers would surely be fine for all of ten minutes.

"SCOTT!!!!" Someone screamed from upstairs. Scott jumped violently, his pencil making a mess of his almost completed homework. The next second he was off, tearing up the stairs, and wondering which brother had managed to maim himself. His next immediate thought was how much trouble he would be in if one of them _had_ managed to maim himself. Oh brother...

Despite the hallway being carpeted, he still managed to skid the last few feet to the door he was pretty sure the yell had come from.

It was the laundry room, and inside someone was dangling inside the washing machine, feet kicking.

The height meant it was...

"Johnny! Are you alright?!" Scott asked, panicked, thinking his younger brother had somehow gotten himself stuck.

"Scott!" John gasped from inside, his voice echoing strangely. His arms came out and he levered himself off the edge, banging his head on the edge as he did so. Scott winced in sympathy at the loud crash it made, and then frowned as he heard...laughter?

John dropped to the floor, his face white. Scott moved the rest of the way into the small room wondering what exactly was going on. His answer came in the form of John's panicked voice.

"Scott! Gordy's in the washing machine!"

"WHAT?!" And Scott lunged at the washing machine looking into the top of it. There sitting at the bottom, clapping his hands, was his kid brother. Gordon looked up at his older brother, and grinned.

"Scotty!"

Scott pulled his head out of the washing to stare at John. "How on earth...? Never mind. Just close the lid as soon as I get him out." He reached in, and if he stood on the very tips of his toes he was just able to grab the giggling toddler. He hefted him out, John shut the lid of the washing machine and Scott set Gordon on top. The kid just continued clapping, as if he had conquered some horribly difficult task.

Staring at his youngest brother incredulously for a moment longer, Scott turned to John.

"_What _was he doing in the washing machine?"

Before the blond had a chance to answer another voice interrupted.

"What's going on?"

Scott spared a glance at his five-year old brother, then took a double take. "Virgil what on earth? Mom said you were painting, not preparing for battle!"

"Huh?"

"You have paint all over your face. It's _everywhere._"

Virgil looked down at himself then back up at Scott and shrugged. Scott rolled his eyes and then turned back to John.

"So?"

"I don't know! I came in here to find my sweater, because I was cold, and mum said she was washing it, and I looked in the washing machine, and Gordy was in it, and I'm too short to reach all the way in, and I yelled for you, and I tried to get him out and I couldn't, and,"

"Whoa, hold up. It's okay. It's not your fault. I just want to know how he got in there so it doesn't happen again."

"Gordy was in the wassing machine?" Scott couldn't help twitching his lips at his little brother's slur, but he didn't bother to correct it.

"Yes Virge, Gordy was in the washing machine," Scott replied. Then he turned to said toddler and continued, "And I have no idea how he got in there."

"Water!" The red head yelled happily and then went back to giggling.

"You've got to be kidding me. You managed to get yourself in there because you wanted to get wet?"

"You gotta admit that's a pretty smart connection for a 3 year old to make." John put in.

"I don't care how smart the connection was, he shouldn't have been in there!" Scott sighed, crossed his arms and glanced around at his brothers. One white as a sheet, one looking as if he had been dunked in bucket of paint, and the third sitting on top of the washing machine he had just been rescued from, his own arms crossed in a mimicry of Scott.

"Okay Gordy. I'm going to tell mom but I am going to say this now. You don't go in the washing machine, alright? Now what don't you do?"

"Go in..." the toddler struggled with the next two words.

"Cleaning box," came a voice from behind Scott.

He turned to Virgil, eyebrows raised.

"What? It's easier to say than washing macine." The multicolored child frowned at his own mispronunciation of the word. Scott just shook his head, but decided he'd try it anyways. Turning back to the brother resting on top of the washer, his little eyebrows raised sky high as he once again tried to copy his older brother, Scott said,

"So don't go in the cleaning box okay Gordy?"

"Don go in cleaning box." The toddler agreed, nodding his head in an exaggerated affirmative.

"Good. Now Virge, can you go and get that paint off your face? Then change and put the clothes in the washer, and for heaven's sake _shut the lid_." Virgil nodded, then padded off in the direction of the bathroom. "John, are you sure you're okay? You're still really pale."

"I'm fine Scott. Just got freaked out when instead of clothes I found him."

"Fair enough. Want to come and help me figure out how Gordo escaped?"

John nodded.

Scott picked Gordon up off the top of the washing machine, bounced him slightly so he had a better grip, which of course sent the little trouble maker into another fit of hysterics, and walked down the hallway towards his room.

He was hardly surprised to find the baby gate, which was supposed to be child proof, wide open. John voiced his thoughts out loud.

"I thought these things were supposed to be child proof?"

Scott did his best attempt at a shrug, the gesture made harder by the fact he was holding a squirming Gordon. He made his way over to the bed and dumped the toddler over the top of the bumper. He then turned to John who was examining the gate, and replied

"Just because it's child proof doesn't mean its Tracy proof."

"What?"

"Dad hasn't told you about your fiasco with the garage?"

"No. What fiasco?" John asked, confused.

"Well I think it was when you were about Gordon's age. Maybe a bit older. Can't really remember that well, given I was only five myself," Scott explained. "We were all heading out for dinner and you were insisting on being the one to open the door. You've figured out by now the keypad isn't an actual alarm, it's just there because Mum and Dad don't want us in there with the power tools. Well you made a big enough fuss about it that Dad eventually picked you up and let you push the buttons, figuring that you'd eventually just get tired of it. We all got a bit of a shock when the light went green the very first time."

"I seriously managed to do that?"

"Yup. And I hacked the baby locks on the kitchen cupboards when I was two," Scott laughed. "Dad had just spent 2 hours installing baby locks on all the cupboards and I walked right up and showed him how to open them. They had to go buy a completely new set."

"What about me?" Another voice asked from the doorway. Virgil was standing there, head just above the level of the baby gate, his face an odd tinged orange color.

"You, my dear brother, nearly gave Mum a heart attack when you managed to open a bottle of Advil at the ripe old age two years and eleven months," Scott answered.

"Can' most people open bottles?"

Once again Scott found himself raising an eyebrow. "Yes. But most children can't open pill bottles because they're child proof."

"What that mean?"

"What _doe__s_ that mean. And it means children shouldn't be able to open it."

"But I did."

"Because you are what is called an exception."

"Eggcepshun."

"Close enough."

The conversation that wasn't really going anywhere was interrupted by a thump from behind them. Scott turned around to see Gordon getting to his feet and toddling merry as you please right up to them.

"You are a right little what's-his-face."

"Houdini?"

Scott just glared at his younger brother. Sometimes John was too smart for his own good.

"Now how did you get out?" Scott questioned his little brother, not really expecting an answer. Gordon's response was falling over. Determined to find out the water loving Tracy's method, Scott picked him up then dumped him back on the bed.

"Scott, what you doin?" Virgil asked from by the door, confused as ever.

"I'm trying to see how he gets out."

"He's not going to do it while you're watching." John said, walking up to stand next to him. But Scott had a plan, and a rather ingenious one at that, thank you very much. He winked at John then took a couple of steps back from the bed. He clapped his hands and held them out to Gordon saying,

"Bath time Gordy!"

"Water in bath! Water in bath!"The toddler cheered. But instead of revealing his cunning plan, he simply pulled himself up to cling to the side of the bumper and waved his arms at Scott.

"Come on Gordy. You need to get out or there's no bath."

Gordon scowled, his eyebrows scrunched up in frustration.

"Bath time!"

"Nuh-uh. Not until you show us how you're getting out."

And to Scott's immense satisfaction he set about doing just that. Gordon dragged the blanket to the edge of the bed, and pushed it right against the bumper. He kept piling it until it made a neat little step up to the edge. He climbed onto it and levered himself up and over the bumper, letting out a "Whee!" as he fell to the earth.

Scott sent John a grin that could only be described as manic. The pressure of the little body suddenly being removed pushed the blanket back out. Not enough that it was spread across the bed of course, but enough that it looked like it had simply been thrown back after he had woken up.

"And that is how you get a toddler to demonstrate how he escapes." Scott stated smugly.

"I guess. But it doesn't explain the baby gate."

However they never got a chance to experiment, as at that moment the sound of the door opening was heard from downstairs.

"Boys I'm back!" their mother called, and they could hear her climbing up the stairs. She poked her head into the room- Scott had yet to figure out how she always knew which room they were in-and looked around at them all. "Is everything all right?"

"Yup. Gordon's just following the family tradition."

"Pardon?"

John took over. "He escaped the bed, and managed to open the baby gate."

Lucy just looked exasperated. "Well I guess I'm not too surprised, it was... Virgil honey, why is your face orange?"

"I was preparin' for battle."

"Uh-huh... Scott?" Lucy questioned, sounding amused.

"What? It wasn't my fault!" he replied indignantly.

"So where was he?" She asked, moving over and picking Gordon up off the floor.

"Ah..."

"He was in the wasing makine!"

Scott could have hit Virgil. That was most definitely not how you broke that sort of thing to one's mother.

"He was... oh my god! Is he okay?!" She immediately began to check the child in her arms for injuries.

"He's fine mom. He gave John a scare but he wasn't hurt."

"Thank god. You boys have a talent for trouble, you know that? And you mister," she said pointing a finger at Gordon, who just giggled and grabbed onto it, "do not try that _ever_ again. Washing machines are for clothes not children."

"Fish friends not food!"

"I... what?" Lucy stared at her son, wondering if he had gotten the message at all.

"You have to call it a cleaning box mom. That's what we called it because he couldn't say washing machine," Scott supplied helpfully.

"But he knows he's not supposed to go in there?"

"Yup."

"Well whatever works, I guess."

She set her youngest son down on the ground, and he immediately made his way over to the little toy box in the corner, fishing out his stuffed clown fish. Lucy just shook her head and smiled.

"Well I need to go call your father. Try to stay out of trouble."

As she exited the room, not bothering to close the gate, knowing Gordon was safe in his older brother's hands she had to wonder. If those four where that much trouble... how bad was this next one going to be?


End file.
